


You Are the Galaxy in My Heart

by OkProblematic



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: I still have no idea what this is, M/M, More metaphors!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-08
Updated: 2014-03-08
Packaged: 2018-01-14 23:31:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1282702
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OkProblematic/pseuds/OkProblematic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Zayn is a sad moon looking for a broken sun. What he finds is a tired blonde boy who may be happier than he seems.</p>
            </blockquote>





	You Are the Galaxy in My Heart

When Zayn turns sixteen, he gets his first tattoo. It’s not exactly legal, but it’s exactly what he wants.

There’s a shitty little parlor on the corner of 14th and Elizabeth, Paul works there and though he threatens to tell Zayn’s parents, he does the tattoo anyways, mumbling something about how “You’re going to regret this, Zayn. When ‘ou’re old this thing is no longer blue.” Zayn ignores him and tries not to cry out when the needle hits his bone.

Louis comes with him (“Somebody needs to make sure you’re not gonna pick a stupid one, dude.”). The boy has blue hair that glitters, for fuck’s sake. Zayn’s not the one making bad decisions; but it’s okay because Louis is infinitely warm and he shines, loud and bright; pretty. He laughs too loud; never loud enough. Sometimes, Zayn swears the older boy’s eyes lashes are made of star dust (“Dude, what the fuck. You’re bat shit crazy.”)

It’s a big tattoo for a first one. It covers most of his left shoulder, reaching towards his back and extending a little ways down his arm. It’s the galaxy, tattooed under his skin and it feels like home. The tattoos makes it look like his skin is shattered, the bright blues and purple and reds and oranges of the universe bleed through.

Overall, it’s Zayn. He is made of stars and suns and moons and planets. His heart whines softly because he’s not bright, even if he’s made up of all of the most incandescent things in the world.

Louis whistles lowly when he sees the tattoo. “Shit Zayn. ‘s a good one. It’s bright, dude.”

“Yeah, yeah it is.”

His mom finds out about it and demands to see it. When Zayn strips of his shirt and turns around, he can hear her sigh as she runs her finger across it, “I’m glad it’s not something stupid, Zayn. But you should’ve asked, or at least told me.”

“You would’ve said no anyways. I’m happy with it, yeah?”

“I would’ve and then you would have gone and gotten it anyways. But, Zayn, I just don’t want you doing something you’ll regret. Just – I like it, okay? But next time, let me know?”

“Okay, Mum.”

—

When he’s seventeen, he and Louis meet Harry. They add them to their rag-tag group of kids that are a little odd and little interested in stars. They work, somehow, their little group of three.

Harry is pretty; he’s too tall for his own good, always tripping over his gangly limbs and giggling while he braces himself. His hair is brown, but Zayn thinks it might be orange, sometimes. He’s cold, always so cold, but Louis is warm and suddenly, they’re in love.

Zayn finds them tangled together under a blanket; it reminds him of Jupiter and its surrounding galaxy.

It’s when Zayn sees Harry softly run a long pale finger across Louis eyelashes and mumble into his neck about “Stardust. Or maybe wonderlust.” that he knows they’re stupid for each other. Louis thinks the curly-haired boy hung the moon (or maybe the stars that reflect in his eyes), Zayn thinks he’s right.

—

Right before he turns eighteen, Liam comes along. Liam is pretty and Zayn may or may not want to sleep with him. He doesn’t, but he wants to.

Liam is warm too, like he spends too much time with the sun. He has a bracelet of string on his wrist, it’s yellow and it’s old and faded and looks like that sun (a used, beaten, broken sun; Zayn’s sun). Liam is older than Zayn and Harry, but younger than Louis, it’s nice to not be in the middle anymore.

Liam has brown hair that he keeps pretty short and razor cheek bones. Zayn thinks he looks a bit like Venus; pretty and powerful. It’s not what he wants.

—

Zayn turns eighteen and all four of them actually move out and get two shitty apartments. They’re cheap and across the hall from each other; one for Louis and Harry, one for Liam and Zayn.

Life is nice, or as nice as it can be when you practically live your three best friends; two of which are stupidly in love with each other and the third is pretty damn close to being in love too. Liam says he really likes this one girl; Danielle. Zayn supposes she’s alright, pretty like Liam and sharp like Venus. It makes sense.

Zayn feels alone, the galaxy on his back no longer enough to keep him warm at night, no longer bright enough to make up for what he lacks. He doesn’t regret it, but noting is the same. He was hoping that maybe he’d find somebody who could light it up and make it burn, someone like the sun.

He gets a heart tattooed on his hip because he can’t seem to find his.

—

When Zayn turns nineteen, Liam moves out and moves in with Danielle. They’re suddenly scary serious and Zayn is suddenly scary alone. Louis and Harry offer to let him stay with them.

He doesn’t. Instead he goes out and spends most of his days walking the city, looking for something, anything (looking for his heart, his sun). What he finds is a blonde boy who is smaller than him and looks a tiny bit like the sun.

The boy takes Zayn home and lets Zayn fuck him into his own mattress. Zayn leaves before the other boy wakes up. He doesn’t feel bad; he doesn’t feel anything, really. He hasn’t felt the burning in his stomach or the pulling in his back in a long while. He doesn’t think he ever will again.

Zayn makes it a habit; letting little blondes take him home and fucking them into their mattresses, leaving before they can wake up and ask him to stay. He is nothing but a trail of broken, almost-sun hearts.

His boys worry about him, but he pretends not to notice, he pretends to be okay. He smiles (but it doesn’t reach his eyes), he laughs (but it’s not him), he speaks (but it’s too soft), he eats (but it’s not enough), he’s a mess (but nobody says anything).

—

By time he’s nineteen and a half, Zayn has fucked more boys than he can count, broken more people than he knows how to fix. He’s broken himself into something he’s never seen.

The whine in his heart has long since grown into a loud wail, it’s far darker than it used to be, a deep feeling. Like a black hole; never to be filled. Zayn waits for the day that he shatters and explodes, shooting out bits of sunlight and stars. He thinks maybe then he’ll be happy.

He wakes up one day and thinks that maybe today will the day, the day he loses it and finds his place among the stars.

He’s wrong, and instead finds himself following a blonde home with a name he actually catches this time, Niall. Niall takes him home like any of them would, except when Niall kisses him against the door, there is no rush or desperation. With all the other suns he’s broken, they’ve been desperate and dirty, wanting whatever Zayn will give them.

Niall isn’t needy, just kissing Zayn slowly and carefully. He has blue eyes and he’s so, so pale. Zayn’s chest burns. When they part, “I’ll hurt you, you know.”

“You might. But I don’t really care, Zayn.”

“You look like the sun.”

“You’re a fucking moon, babe.”

“The waves are bigger when there’s an eclipse.”

“I know, can’t you feel them?”

Zayn sighs and slumps against Niall’s neck, breathing deeply, “Yeah. I’ve missed them.”

Niall leads him upstairs anyways, grumbling about “Feckin’ roommates, leave their shit everywhere”. They fall into Niall’s bed still clothed and Zayn’s back pulls. He gasps quietly but Niall doesn’t ask.

“Why do ya miss the waves, hmm?”

“Haven’t felt in control in a long time. Haven’t felt full.”

“But you do now?”

“Yeah. Yeah I do. Guess so.”

“Why is that.”

“Maybe you’re the fuckin’ sun I’ve been looking for. Maybe you’re my heart. I dunno.”

“Have you been missin’ your heart too?”

“Yeh. So I got it tattooed on my hip.”

“You got any other tattoos then, Zayn?”

“One. It’s uh, kinda old, but I love it.”

“Let’s see it then?”

“Yeah, okay.” Zayn sits up and slips out of his shirt, bearing his back to Niall.

The blonde gasps and runs a finger down the ink. “’s gorgeous, Zee.” Zayn’s lips quirk at the name and he swallows before turning around and taking Niall’s face in his hands.

“Almost as gorgeous as you, my broken sun.”

“How did you – “

“Know? I just kind of guessed.”

“Oh.” And then they’re kissing again.

Zayn doesn't fuck Niall, but he doesn’t leave either. Instead he stay the night and then stays until the next afternoon while they talk stars and eat takeout. Zayn goes home a little heavier, the black hole in his chest glowing from the bottom, some of the light reaching up and dripping over the edge.

—

When Zayn turns twenty, the black hole completely overflows and light is spilling into his veins, making him glow. He smiles and his eyes crinkle.

Somehow, Niall and Zayn fell together with a lot of soft smiles and tender touches, a lot of talks of the moon and his sun, the pretty pale blonde and the tanned mystery. Niall meets Harry and Louis and recently married Liam and Danielle.

Liam had explained it to him; Danielle was the ocean, her gravity pulling Liam, her moon to him. They couldn’t ever be anything less. Louis still revolves around Harry and Jupiter starts to warm up, bit by bit.

All of them had loved Niall, none more so than Zayn. He’s never been in love before, but he thinks it only makes sense; the sun died everyday just for the moon to come out and how could you not love someone who dies for you all the time? You can’t; and so, Zayn loves Niall.

Niall loves Zayn. He’s not afraid, just bright and shiny and pleased. Zayn is still dark, but is a cool kind of dark, he’s not one much for shimmery dark but he finds it’s what fits him best.

When Zayn fucked Niall, it was into the mattress, their mattress, but it was slow and careful. They come together to let the tide rise high up on the beaches, destroying others’ declarations of love, washing away the “I love you”’s written in the sand, picking them up and whispering them against each others sweaty skin.

—

When Zayn turned twenty-one they left their little apartment and used the money to get to the states, two stupid boys in love.

Niall shows him the moon and the stars, shows him the comets and asteroids and how everything works together. Zayn get the sun tattooed across his heart, pretty and bleeding in shades of Niall.

It’s new, this entire being whole thing and having someone to share the sky with. This whole proper lovers thing, but Zayn doesn’t think he minds. He thinks he understands all those sayings about the moon loving the sun and the sun loving the moon.

Because they are the sad, rebel moon and the broken, witty sun; sharing the sky and breaking those under them with every breath they take.

**Author's Note:**

> Also littleredmalik on Tumblr! Comments and such are loved!


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